Diary of a writing, reading, animal loving, travelling Penguin and his mate who love collecting Penguin books, taking photographs and talking to people about Tasmania, Australia

Friday, 8 August 2014

Books Galore at the NEW Tip Shop

Construction work at the site of the tip (dump to you Americans) had been going on for ages and nobody knew what was going on. Suddenly there was a grand opening. Yeah, a grand opening of a tip shop, the dump, landfill. When Australia was going through the "collector's frenzy" as the rest of the world probably knows with England's Bargain Hunt and America's Pickers, Container Wars etc. everything was marked up in price sky high. Penguins in the tip shop went from 10 cents, 50 cents suddenly to 2, 3, 5 dollars a book.

Of course nobody bought them so they sat on shelves for ages. They also took the best of the best from the tip landfill and opened up a shop in the city centre called "Collectables." Now, that store was expensive. I found an old, smelly Penguin book that somebody thought was rare because the colour was the wrong colour for the genre. Some bright spark found somewhere that a particular book had been printed with a purple cover and the staff member said it was supposed to be green.

Well, actually it was supposed to be cerise because it was a travel and adventure. He put $20.00 on it. I explained to him it wasn't worth half that but nope, no luck. It sat on the shelf for over 2 years. Then they marked it down to $10.00. I told him again it wasn't worth half that as it was filthy dirty, yellowed and it really did smell. Nope, no luck. Next year it went down to 50 cents and they still couldn't sell it. I don't know what happened to it in the end.

Anyway. Collectables closed. Ha! I knew it would. They priced themselves right out of the market and everything in this two story building went back to the.............guess where? The Tip Shop. The downmarket tip shop. Last stop - Landfill. I was delighted. Not only that but they opened a wonderful, brand new building. Purpose built for all those things that are excellent all the way down to can't even sell it in an op shop. This really is the last stop before landfill sucks the stuff into its bowels.

Good news is there are tons of books and they are actually sorted. Not really into any kind of genres but on fresh new book shelves that you can read, not scattered around in shopping trolleys that you have to dig through.

Well I went to the tip shop today as I was out on my bike. The sun was shining, it was 11 degrees C so not bad (52 for you Farenheit people). I hadn't been there in a while so the Penguin hunting began in earnest. This is what I found. All of these books for $8.00 in total. Enjoy (if you're a Penguin person like some of us) and until next time......

Part of the book section. There are about 5 or 6 shelves like this.

A Penguin Vintage Puffin
Original Puffins are harder to find than Penguins b/c children were hard on them.

Another old Puffin Book

Number 2133 Looks like a real cold war book from late 50's to 60's

Number 2816- How sixties does this look.

This is a real find. Green ones are quite collectable and this is a very early first.
Number 279

An old Georgette Heyer at 2511. Interesting cover.

This book is from the Penguin Poets series. An interesting cover.

I find these little partial Penguins as I call them that have been removed from boxed sets.
The original boxed sets were published for Penguin's 60th birthday. I have the completed box sets
but whenever I see these little books I pick them up because I can't stand the thought of them lying in landfill with the
seagulls pecking at them. I have a whole pile of them.

9 comments:

TV and the Internet have made it difficult to find undiscovered gems of any kind almost anywhere. These days anyone with even a smidgen of gumption can find out that some ratty old thing, book or otherwise, is worth something. Of course a seller can often make the mistake of thinking they can automatically cash in on knowing something might be rare and collectible. I guess, in some ways, this makes book hunting even more fun and satisfying when you do come across the gem that is still only 50 cents.

I too worry about books ending up in the trash. I have two copies of Rose Macauley's As Told by Idiots. Although I like her, I didn't really like this book. The Virago copy I put in one of the little libraries that have popped up in my neighborhood, the other one is an old hardcover in pretty decent shape. I just know that without a dust jacket to let a casual browser know what the book is about, it will end up in the trash somewhere. There must be a Macauley fan out there who would love to own that book.

I always pick up Penguins even if I have them if found cheaply. Don't want them to end up pulped. Would rather they go in with a collection. I keep them if I don't have them and then send any that Karyn (penguinaweek) does not have. If she has them they go in a Penguin box and when I get enough go to auction and some second hand book dealer buys them or another Penguin collector. At least they've stepped back from landfill for awhile.

The Tip shop supports long term unemployed. Creates jobs. People with gas masks go out on the tip face and retrieve things that are in good shape to sell in shop. But a lot of people just come straight to the shop with goods to get rid of to sell off. Everything is donated. We have four tip shops in the area I know of so I generally make the rounds every couple of months.

Tip shop: what a great idea!Here in Dorset UK, everyone calls the tip The Dump. But the Council calls it the Waste Disposal Site.You can buy things there but there's no cover, so you have to choose a dry spell if you're hoping to find books. What good finds you had.

Oo **slobber** that is my idea of heaven. We don't have a 'tip shop' here...at least not my way. Most of the things that end up at the tip get recycled as far as I'm aware but what a fabulous idea. My personal favourite place to leave my unwanted is the book swap box at our train station :-) (or Oxfam, of course)